1. Field of Invention
The invention relates to a recording apparatus for printing by the use of an ink ribbon cartridge mounted with a replaceable wide ink ribbon.
2. Description of Related Art
When a thermal printer is used to print on ordinary paper, generally a ribbon cartridge is used because of easy handling. When the thermal printer is a line printer, it is necessary to use a wide ink ribbon.
The wide ink ribbon, when used, is likely to crease. A crease in the ink ribbon adversely affects printing quality, and therefore it is desirable to prevent crease occurrence. To ensure this, it becomes necessary to provide a proper amount of tension to the ink ribbon between the press roller for pressing the recording paper and the ink ribbon to the recording surface of the print head and the take-up spindle of the ink ribbon. In earlier embodiments during development if such a tension was applied, however, the take-up spindle rose, resulting in a creased ink ribbon.
That is, the take-up spindle of the ink ribbon was provided on the ribbon cartridge side, and was supported by the take-up spindle support section on the casing body side when the ink ribbon cartridge was mounted in a specific position in the casing body. In this case, however, it was necessary to allow the take-up spindle to advance into the take-up spindle support section on the casing body side. Such a structure can not preclude the rise of the take-up spindle. The rise of the take-up spindle, even if as little as about 0.2 mm, resulted in serious damage to the printing quality, particularly when the take-up spindle is made of paper and a synthetic resin to reduce manufacturing costs, the take-up spindle, being light in weight, presents a serious problem.
However, in this earlier laboratory prototype recording apparatus, no special measures were adopted to prevent the rise of the take-up spindle and a sufficient tension to restrain the rise of the take-up spindle was applied to the ink ribbon. The structure can not fully restrain the occurrence of ink ribbon crease, resulting in a deteriorated printing quality.